


What May Come

by CatalpaWaltz



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Absinthe!, Alternate Universe - 19th Century, Alternate Universe - Moulin Rouge, Betrayal!, Dubious Consent, Implied / Referenced Past Abuse, M/M, Prostitution, TRUE LOVE!, jealousy!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-21
Updated: 2016-05-21
Packaged: 2018-06-09 18:03:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,435
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6917599
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CatalpaWaltz/pseuds/CatalpaWaltz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Or: the self-indulgent, fast-and-loose Moulin Rouge!AU that (almost) nobody asked for. </p><p>New York, 1899. It's the end of the century, the beginning of a new age. While Continental News Corp's Editor-in-Chief George Washington fights daily battles to combat corruption and hang on to his job, Alexander Hamilton yearns to fly away to a kind of freedom that feels ever-more distant, and a political storm is brewing that promises to bring triumph or ruin. And the greatest thing they'll ever learn? Wait for it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What May Come

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I am a total neophyte when it comes to this period of history, so expect anachronisms galore. Also, everything I know about the newspaper business I learned from watching Early Edition reruns as a kid so that's likely going to be a weak spot.

What May Come 

 

1899.

New York City.

Dawn was breaking over the shadowed streets of Lower Manhattan, the sun just beginning to kiss the top storeys of the tallest buildings. The silence of the early hour was punctuated only by the cries of paper boys and fruit vendors, the distant patter and creak of hansom cabs a few blocks away. Washington savored these times, when the air was cool and fresh, and the mist that rolled in from the harbor softened all the hard edges of the world. 

In the offices of the Mount Vernon Publishing Corporation, however, the day was already well underway. Awaiting him in the bullpen, three of his best lieutenants were industriously assembling the evening edition while clerks in distant corners collated telegrams from their outlying media properties. He stood in the doorway for a moment, casting an approving gaze over the scene of well-oiled efficiency, which might almost recall the factory if it were not for the barely-perceptible frisson of nervous energy that pervaded all newsrooms. At any rate, Washington's operation was far and away considered the most remarkable of any paper in the city, a model of crisp competence aided by the uncanny ability to gather the kind of choice intelligence that made for the best headlines. 

He passed through the open room to the great mahogany door of his office to a chorus of "good morning, sirs" and respectful nods. When he reached the back wall, he signaled to one of his assistant editors to follow him into his office. 

"Anything to report?" he asked, settling into his chair and preparing to turn his attention to the neat stack of correspondence perched at the corner of his desk. 

"Nothing of note, sir," said Tilghman, shuffling through several sheafs of rough copy. It had never seemed remarkable to Washington that they could carry on these meetings without scarcely making eye contact, but Tilghman always had affairs so well in hand that it would have been wasteful to bestow his full attention on such conferences. 

Having found what he was looking for, Tilghman set a few sheets of longhand notes before him. 

"Tallmadge does seem to have caught on the trail of several intriguing pieces of gossip," he said, "but I scarcely think any of them fit to print. That's his report there." 

"Has he?" said Washington, his eyes briskly scanning the page of notes. One item proved intriguing enough to merit a rare lift of his eyebrow. 

"What's this about Clinton Electric? They are considering reversing their decision on the Albany plant? They're seeking investors?" 

"Ah, best not worry yourself about that, sir, not until we can further substantiate it." 

Washington frowned. Normally he deeply appreciated the restraint shown by his lieutenants when it came to crafting solid foundations for their stories. It certainly went a long way to differentiate them from the kinds of scurrilous rags that proliferated like rats in a sewer, each only lasting a long as they were able to shock and titillate whatever measly share of the market they could garner. But there were occasions, rare though they were, when he rather wished his subordinates might give freer rein to their instincts. 

He tapped the page smartly with the tip of a blunt finger. 

"Tell Tallmadge to make this his priority for now. I suspect there's something more to it."

"Yes sir." 

"If that was all?" 

Tilgman nodded, and turned towards the door, recognizing the informal dismissal. But just as he was reaching for the handle he stopped himself. 

"Begging your pardon, sir. There was one other thing. A message that the Baron left for you." 

Washington waved a hand to indicate to Tilghman that he should continue. 

"He wished you to know that he's scheduled a meeting for you, at the close of business today. And he wished to extend his best wishes for your birthday." At that last, Tilghman lowered his voice with a conspiratorial grin, as though guarding the information from any prying ears that might be pressed against the office door. 

Washington blinked. He had, in all honesty, forgotten all about it. Still, it was not entirely surprising. He had never much gone in for birthdays. 

Collecting himself, he asked, "What is the meeting? Who is it with?" 

Tilghman's face pinched inward in the way it always did when faced with someone else's incompetence. 

"He did not say, sir. I could send Meade to confirm ---" 

"No, no need." Washington was quite sure he knew who the meeting would be with, or at least what sort of meeting it was likely to be. Von Steuben, or "The Baron" as he was affectionately known, was well-understood to survive in business purely by virtue of his generous and gregarious spirit, a spirit he also tended to assume all others around him were equally possessed of. This, coupled with the fact that he knew just about every family worth knowing in the city, meant that George had often been called upon to mentor or find jobs for the young sons of the Baron's friends and associates. He was well-practiced at such interviews, and he had every confidence that he could manage to make his way through one in short order. 

In the meantime, he had leads to chase. 

\-------------------------

In the back offices of the firm of Beekman & Cruger, Alexander Hamilton carefully wound a black silk tie under his starch-stiff collar, and inspected himself in the glass. 

"This Baron," he asked offhand, his gaze not diverting from his own reflection, "what is he like?" 

Several steps behind him, the bulky figure of Nicholas Cruger loomed up out of the shadows cast by the sputtering gas lamp. For a moment, Alexander thought that all he was going to get in response to his question was a rebuke, some variation on _"what in the hell does it matter to you what he's like?"_ But it was not forthcoming. Instead, his employer hummed thoughtfully before answering: 

"Popular. I can't speak to his _personality_ per se, but he's certainly well-liked, and well-known." 

It was not the kind of answer Alexander had wanted, but he mused over it for a moment all the same, carefully fastening his cuffs as he did so. 

What he really wanted to ask, of course, was what stood to be gained from their impending ...transaction. Normally it was crystal clear. Cruger would send Alexander out, and the next morning the firm would find themselves named partners in a new shipping or rail venture, or they would discover that potential legal difficulties that had once stood in the way of some lucrative deal had been brushed aside. In any case, the profit was always quickly apparent, and it was always _considerable_. He pursed his lips together and continued to fiddle with his tie. 

"Does he have any particular connections that you are interested in pursuing? Or is this purely...exploratory?" 

Try as he might, Alexander couldn't manage to entirely keep a note of resentment out of his voice, but he couldn't really help himself. Surely if this was just about gaining inroads with the friends-of-friends, Cruger could do the thing himself?

At that thought, Alexander had to choke back a sudden bark of laughter -- the resulting mental image was certainly comical, if not disconcerting. No, what he had meant was surely this was a matter that could be handled over cards, or port and cigars at the Waldorf. 

"I wouldn't concern yourself overmuch with that," snapped Cruger. "Your task is simply to do as you're told." 

With the ease of long practice, Alexander backpedaled, retrenched, and tried again. 

"I only wished to know, " he began, his voice softened almost to a simper, "what it is he _likes_." 

Instead of responding straight away, Cruger closed the space between them and rested his hands on Alexander's shoulders, appraising the young man's appearance with an expression that always made Alexander feel like a bale of cotton or a boxcar of steel rail: utterly commodified. In one sweep, he took in the gleam of Alexander's wingtip shoes, the neat press of his dark wool trousers, close-cut jacket, and shining dark hair, parted with mathematical precision down the center and falling to his shoulders. Brushing an imaginary fleck of lint from the shoulders of the younger man's coat, he made an approving noise and stepped away before he spoke. 

"In particular? He is said to have quite the penchant for military types." 

Alexander huffed at that. He could, he was sure, affect the bearing and mien of an officer if the occasion called for it, but he was not sure he was cut out for aping the thoughtless submission of a soldier. Well, he would play it by ear. Was that not precisely what he was best at --- improvisation? 

"You have not done business with him before?" 

"Not as such, no. Not this kind of business. But I would not let that worry you, my boy." 

The appellation, as it always did, made Alexander stifle a shudder. Cruger, as he always did, failed to notice. 

\------------------------------------

Some hours later, Alexander was received at the door of a stately pile at Mercer and Prince St. He was led up to an open office, an imposing space of dark-paneled walls and immaculate desks lined up with all the precision of a military camp. The young man who had let him in took his coat and hat. 

"If you'll wait here just a moment" he said, "I'll let him know you've arrived." 

"Thank you." 

From a back office, Alexander could make out the sound of a rolling baritone voice. 

"Thank you, McHenry. Send him in, then you may go." 

Apparently anxious to absent himself, McHenry directed him to the door and promptly departed. 

Standing in the window, Alexander could make out the tall, solid figure of a man in a dark suit. He gazed out onto the tableau of the street below, its activity just beginning to wind down with the conclusion of the work day. He seemed so lost in thought that Alexander almost hated the necessity of breaking the silence. 

"I hope I am not keeping you from anything important," he said, his voice light. 

"Hm? Oh, not at all, not at all. You're my last appointment of the day." 

The empty office had made that rather abundantly clear, but Alexander didn't point it out. 

"All the better," he said instead, allowing an edge of mischief to creep into his intonation. "That will give us plenty of time to...confer." 

The Baron (for who else could it be? Alexander thought -- with that bearing and stature he certainly merited the title) turned at last from the window, and Alexander got his first good look at him. Suffice it to say that he liked what he saw. 

He fixed Alexander with a look that might have concealed an infinite spectrum of possibilities, and Alexander felt an inexplicable frisson of electricity pass through him. He had never had difficulty keeping himself detached from these kinds of encounters, but something like genuine interest was sprouting in the back of his awareness, patient, ready to wait for that which would permit it to grow. 

With that look, he was half-expecting to by pressed up against the wall at once, but instead he was directed into an old-fashioned ladder-back chair before the great mahogany desk. 

"You'll forgive me," said the Baron, "but they neglected to tell me your name when this meeting was arranged. It's not the kind of oversight my people usually make, but if you'd oblige me, Mr --" 

"Hamilton," he said, blurting out a name that he had never, _ever_ given to a patron before now. Practically kicking himself, he figured that he might as well be in for a pound. "Alexander Hamilton." 

"Well, Alexander, I wish to say first and foremost that I hope you weren't given any, shall we say, false hopes, or false impressions of what this conversation might achieve."

"Oh, no sir. I assure you, its purpose was made exceedingly clear." Here he flashed what he had been told was his most charming smile, which was not returned. 

The mood was decidedly...chilly. Alexander knew quite well how to persevere through spaces of awkward trepidation, how to coax clients into actually claiming what they'd paid for, if only to avoid their embarrassment (and all the ugly things that come when men of their social standing feel they have been humiliated). He hoped the Baron would offer him a drink. That always did so much to ease the situation. And there was a kind of stiffness, an intensity about the Baron that he had not expected. He might have said he seemed repressed, but the man had after all _arranged_ this meeting --- how repressed could he possibly be? 

"Well, be that as it may, I think we should begin by discussion what field you wish to enter, and what your qualifications are. I'm afraid I am not looking to hire anyone at entry-level at the moment, but I would be happy to help direct your efforts somewhere they might bear fruit." 

_Qualifications?_ Alexander thought. _What in the lord's name was this about?_ For a fraction of moment he battled abject confusion. But then Alexander recalled a previous occasion, a memory he had quite actively suppressed, of an engagement with the president of a prestigious college upstate, who had staged their encounter as though it were some sort of interview for admission, and Alexander was expected, as the bright-eyed prospective scholar, to demonstrate with every means at his disposal the ardency of his wish to matriculate. It had been one of the most humiliating occasions of his life, not least of which because the little scene the old professor had spun out had struck Alexander so near his core. What galled him most was that he _would_ have done such things, performed such acts, to fulfill the promise that the old professor was only _pretending_ to dangle in front of him; the freedom to pursue whatever course of study he wished, access to more books than he could hope to read in a lifetime -- just the thought of it filled Alexander with so much want that his chest actually ached.

Well, if he could play the desperate would-be student, playing the desperate would-be journalist certainly couldn't be that difficult. 

"I think that sounds very reasonable," he said, after a pause that had stretched just this side of uncomfortable. 

"Let's start with your family. What does your father do?"

Alexander cast his mind around. 

"They're lawyers, for the most part, my father as well. But I've never felt bound by tradition in that respect."

"Oh really? And why is that?"

"The way I see it," mused Alexander, who was really getting into his stride, "a man should only want to go into law when history provides him the opportunity to do something greater with his skills. I might be interested in _making_ the law, but the thought of learning it simply to apply it  
in the same dull ways has little interest for me."

Washington considered this --- an honest answer, from an ambitious man. He probed further. 

"Have you ever thought to enter politics? They may not be a model of efficiency, but I hear tell that some of our legislative bodies are still in the business of making laws."

Alexander wrinkled his nose in reflexive, visceral disgust.

"Not for a moment, sir."

"No," said Washington thoughtfully, "no, I don't think you'd be suited for it. But you said you write?"

"Yes sir, a little." 

"Do you by chance have a sample of your work on hand?"

Alexander's heart seized. He had, folded in the pocket of his coat, a scrap of an editorial he had begun scribbling that morning, on the subject of factory fires and the measures that might be undertaken to prevent them. It wasn't much, but he had hoped to continue it. Maybe he could…

But no. He was forgetting himself. This was not an interview, however much he might wish it were --- that was merely the spider silk veneer overlaying the truth of his business there. He adopted a coy half-smile.

"I'm afraid not. I shall have to remember to do so next time."

Washington's expression was unaltered, but in truth he was a little disappointed. It was not as though he was in any way dissatisfied with the work his reporters produced, but he did wonder at times if they might have benefitted from a more assertive voice. Perhaps the Baron had been onto something after all, sending this young man to him. 

"Yes, yes I think you ought to do that."

Alexander felt something warm bloom up and out from his chest. Next time. To his great surprise, he found he was already looking forward to it. 

"Well, if you have no further questions for me, sir ---" he prompted, shifting a little in his seat. 

"If it's all the same to you, I'd prefer to get this over and done with." 

Very well then. Alexander stood, affecting again that crisp military bearing, pretending not to take in the Baron's look of mild bemusement.

"By all means, sir, let's have it over and one with." 

He went to the other man's side of the desk, grasped the back of the fine leather chair and spun it 'round ( _bless whoever invented these,_ he thought) so that they were face to face. Then he went to his knees. 

\--------------------------

Something in Washington's brain misfired. His head felt hollow, and Alexander was like a thousand bells ringing, ricocheting off blank walls and leaving nothing but chaos and confusion. While he sat, shocked into stillness, the younger man lifted his hands to rest lightly on Washington's thighs. Even through the wool of his trousers, the touch of those hands was searing, electrifying. Slowly, so slowly, he began to run his palms up toward Washington's hips, humming appreciatively as his fingers skimmed over corded muscle. His mouth had fallen open, just a little, and Washington could not stop tracing its contours with his gaze, certain he had never seen a mouth like that. 

However long his brain might be taking to process this inexplicable turn of events, Washington's body understood exactly what was on offer, and it was broadcasting its furious assent. It yearned to let the young man proceed, yearned to set a gentle, heavy hand on that shining dark hair, and ---

"I think," he said, his voice a hoarse, strangled parody of itself, "that there has been some kind of misunderstanding." 

Alexander might have been prepared to persist in spite of this, to accept it as simply another part of the elaborate fiction that was spun around them, around what he was there to do, but the look on the other man's face was a more honest, raw-edged expression than anything Alexander had yet seen from him. He stopped. His cheeks already burning, he returned to his feet with all the dignity he could muster, smoothing out the wrinkles that had appeared in his jacket. 

"You are not the Baron?" he asked, taking great care to keep his voice level. 

"What? No!" Washington exclaimed. "Why would you think --" but the answer very quickly came to him. 

"I apologize. You have been... misinformed," he said, and then, through gritted teeth -- "but I am confident that I know who is responsible." 

Alexander took a breath. "So, who are you?" 

Washington gave his name, and the flush in Alexander's face receded leaving behind a sickly pallor. 

Washington. _George Washington_. The man who had rescued Rivington's Gazette from irrelevance and financial ruin and built it into the single most respected outlet in the city --- the very Gazette where Alexander submitted so much of his work, where he had dreamed of someday seeing his own name in print. How many times had he imagined these very offices, walking these very halls, and _belonging_ there. _A real journalist._ He would have laughed, if he did not feel like he was on the verge of being physically ill. 

"I will have to answer for this," he said after a moment, not meeting Washington's eyes, not ready to see that look of sincere interest replaced by the naked contempt of the upright man for the pitiful whore. 

"Say whatever you need to. I will not have -- that is, this is not your fault." 

Grateful as he was for the kind words, Alexander could not collect himself to make a proper reply. 

"I -- I should go," was all he said, and without waiting for Washington's response, he all but fled for the door.


End file.
